So what’s next for Arts Barge?

Phew. 50 days to reach a target of £23,440 and with your help we did it. So what will your money do for the project and what’s next on the agenda?

What your money has enabled us to do

The cash raised via the crowd-funder, together will all the funds you’ve helped us to raise in the past, means that the project is ready to get a planning application together and secure a permanent mooring for Selby Tony. The permanent mooring won’t be in the Foss Basin – that’s never been the plan. We’re looking for a city-centre mooring on the River Ouse so that we can optimise the visibility of the barge and make sure it stays good and busy with both residents and visitors.

We’ve already done important work on the hull of the barge with money previously raised by events such as Riverside festival. We’ve also completed the complex assessment by a naval architect whose job it is to tell us how many people we can fit on the barge and what infrastructure it can support – basically the roof and fittings etc.

At the moment our other architect, David Spencer of DSP, is working on the design and drawings so that we can offer a clear picture of what the finished barge will look like and what it can offer to the community. David has worked pro-bono for the last 6 years, helping us all the way through the choosing and purchase of the barge and all the works necessary to get it to this point. Your money also means we can pay him for this crucial part of the work and get on with it straight away.

Once David’s work is completed we’ll submit a planning application – exciting times!

How you can help

When we submit the planning application we’ll be calling on you all to write in support of the project so that the council can see the demand for it. We’ll give you details of how to do that once the application is on the planning portal.

What about the money to finish the renovation? Where will that come from?

You’ve all be unbelievably generous for many years now and it’s your help which has made this project happen to this point. But realistically we can’t expect to raise the full amount of funding from our community. At the moment our estimate is that it will cost between £170 – £200,000 to do this work. This may sound a lot but it’s less than the price of an average house in York and will not only provide a home for us but will offer the community a genuinely inspirational hub for a host of other creative activities. As importantly, it will be a space for absolutely anyone to come and enjoy – whether they’re an artist, or coming to an event or just wanting to sit on the barge and watch the world go by.

So now it’s our job to secure the rest of the funds through grants and sponsorship to do the actual barge renovation. We’ve got some excellent support for this and, once we’re through the planning phase, we’re confident that we have an excellent package to present to potential funders and sponsors. We’re already working on that so that once planning consent comes through we’re ready to hit the ground running.

There are some unknowns of course – we can’t say with 100% that we’ll obtain planning consent which is why it’s so important to have your support.

Thank you for everything you’ve done so far. Keep spreading the word and supporting us! For anyone wanting to make a donation you can do this at any time on our Local Giving Sitewhere we can also claim gift aid on donations.